


What Didn't I Know?

by desperationandgin



Category: Lost
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-03
Updated: 2013-08-03
Packaged: 2017-12-22 06:20:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/909918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/desperationandgin/pseuds/desperationandgin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>James buries Juliet after the incident at the Swan site.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Didn't I Know?

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize for your tears right now.

He was gonna propose to her here.  
  
It’s sunny and green; a place they had picnics once or twice when they could both get away.   
  
And now, instead, he’s burying her.  
  
James stands in the hole, leaning against his shovel and panting heavily. He doesn’t get it, where he went wrong, what he should have done instead. He doesn’t understand why Juliet changed her mind – how did he look at Kate? What the hell did he do that made her think they didn’t belong together? He rewinds every moment in his mind, from the minute he told her they were back, to the time she stormed off in the jungle after giving him a line about never meeting him or losing him.  
  
“Hey boss…you about done down there?”  
  
James opens his eyes, voice a low rumble. “Gimmie a damn minute. You got somewhere you gotta be or somethin’?”  
  
He hears Miles shuffle off, then changes his mind. “Wait, c’mere.” When he sees the other man kneeling there, James speaks again. “What’d I miss, Miles? What didn’t I pick up on?”  
  
Miles looks confused for just a few seconds until he gets what he’s being asked, and then he shrugs. “You called her ‘Freckles’.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Back at the house, you called her ‘Freckles’. Kate. I know, because I looked right at Juliet. So did Hurley.”  
  
James lowers his head, trying to remember that conversation, whatever it was.  
  
 _Come with us, Freckles._  
  
And then Juliet gave her the fence code, and  _son of a bitch_. He throws the shovel down and yells, barely registering that Miles has backed up away from the hole. James hauls himself out and falls to his knees next to her body. “Why didn’t you say somethin’?” he asks, voice ragged. His hands move the tarp off of her face and he looks over his shoulder for a second. “Get me some water.”  
  
Miles does what he’s asked, bringing a canteen over, and James wets a corner of the tarp, wiping her face off gently. “I’m sorry, baby,” and Miles has to walk away, leaning over with his hands on his knees because his best friend’s girl is dead, and hell, he loved her too.  
  
When James has done the best he thinks he can, he gets back into the grave. “Alright. Hand her down to me,” he says, jaw clenching. He holds his arms out to take her, her head falling heavy on his shoulder, and through the blood and metal there’s a hint of DHARMA shampoo, or maybe he’s imagining it. But he has her and lies her down through a glaze of tears. He doesn’t want to leave her alone; he keeps going through it in his mind. He leaves her here and what does he do? He never had a plan once she agreed to stay after the two weeks was up on how to live on the island without her. He decides he’s going back to Dharmaville. He don’t care what Kate and Jack are doin’, they’ve already done enough, and he hauls himself back out of the grave.  
  
Her hair is coming out from under the tarp and James looks over at Miles. “You wanna say somethin’?”  
  
“I uh. Thanks for not killing me when I told half of the security team that I caught you and Jim making out in the ammo locker. And…you were always kinda like the sister I wanted. Oh, and that time you lost your keys, I was just fucking with you, I put them in the freezer. I’m gonna miss you, Juliet.”  
  
James runs a hand through his hair after Miles trails off and looks out into the jungle. “I wonder if she woulda said yes.”  
  
Miles looks at him, blinking a little. “Of course she would have.”  
  
“Maybe if I’d just asked her, none of this would have ever happened.”  
  
“How do you figure?”  
  
James just shrugs a little, not sure what the hell he means, and he scoops up a shovelful of dirt, tossing it down. It feels like a punch to the stomach when it lands on her. “She never got off this rock. Even dead, she’s gotta…” He trails off, focusing on shoveling and not speaking anymore. He knows he can’t leave her, not alone. Not when all she ever wanted was to get out and he made her stay.  
  
 _I’m glad you talked me out of it._  
  
He can’t leave her here.


End file.
